BiosphereSmart: sharing knowledge on climate change, green economies, and sustainable development

BiosphereSmart is a global observatory created to share ideas, knowledge, good practices, and experiences among Biosphere Reserves on issues related to climate change, green economies, and sustainable development.
The BiosphereSmart Initiative is based on the idea to maximise the use of new information technologies to build a covenant for a sustainable future and a transition to green societies based on knowledge. Citizens become both beneficiaries and key actors of the information and participation tools of the project. They can also be sensors able to provide information about their spatial experiences, improving their capacity of participation.

Biosphere Smart provides this web-based platform with the aim of: 

• Sharing ideas and best practices on issues related to sustainable development and climate change;
• Sharing experience and lessons in using biosphere reserves as green economy models;
• Promoting sustainable urban futures issues within biosphere reserves and their surroundings;
• Providing an educational tool with mapping and advanced communication services;
• Empowering sustainable communities to improve their access to information and decision-making capacity;
• Improving  information and response capacity for managers and scientific community in biosphere reserves;
• Share and facilitate access to the knowledge and expertise of the scientific community;
• Strengthen partnerships within the World Network of Biosphere Reserves (WNBR).

The BiosphereSmart Initiative was launched during the 24th Session of the International Co-ordinating Council (ICC) of the Man and the Biosphere (MAB) Programme (2012), which highlighted the "need of the MAB Programme and its networks to be a substantial tool for the implementation of the Rio+20 follow up and for this purpose on the need for the improvement of the communication by using tools like Biosphere SMART on green economies and by using biosphere reserves as study sites for all UNESCO Programmes".

⇒ BiosphereSmart Initiative website

BIOSPHERE RESERVES AS MODEL REGIONS FOR A GREEN ECONOMY

A brochure published by the Germany Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) presents “Biosphere Reserves” as an ideal instrument for German development cooperation to support partner countries in their efforts towards conservation and sustainable use of their biodiversity. 

Brochures cover “ Biospheres Reserves, Model

Regions for a Green Economy”. Source: BMZ

Most people think that nature conservation only means to have clean water and fertile soils, but its implications are deeper than at first sight; sustainable development needs also biodiversity conservation, needs to find a balance between human and nature, because our own live is closely related to the environment.

The aim of this project is to give an economic value to the importance that Biosphere Reserves have for local populations. German development cooperation considers that UNESCO Biosphere Reserves represents ideal scenes where to support partner countries in their efforts towards conservation and sustainable use of their own biodiversity, where to make the systems of production and consumption more environmentally friendly. In this sense, it is important to take into account the “Man and the Biosphere” programme of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to achieve a sustainable use of natural resources.

Cocoa sourcing. Source: Tp Honduras

Biosphere Reserves should be considered as international pilot regions in a position to pursue environmentally sound ways of living in a sustainable society, in which is important a relationship between the human activities and the biological richness of each area. This fact doesn’t mean that local populations only protect the environment, but they conserve the natural values and, at the same time, make an ecological-intelligent use of them to achieve maximum benefits for both.

 

Drinking water from renewables. Source: Ecoticias

The most important activities behind this perspective are sustainable forms of land use, adequate use of forest, use of renewable energies and fair trade. All Biospheres Reserves promote environmental and socially sustainable tourism. There are also other remarkable aspects; i.e. these natural areas constitute also huge carbon reservoirs, essentials in climate change mitigation.

The first step is this process to deepen in our knowledge about those characteristics that distinguish each territory, its conservation priorities and its potentialities for sustainable development of the local populations.

If you are interested in the subject can read the full broached in the following link:

http://www.bmz.de/en/publications/topics/business/Materialie212_Biosphere_Reserves.pdf